Gone Camping

Chapter 2

Jacob Olivier is having himself a scrimmage. 

The junior defensive back looks like he might weigh a buck twenty-five after eating a hearty meal and sticking a 10 pound weight in his shorts but at this moment he also looks like the best player on the field. 

The place? Staley High School. The situation? A high school football camp featuring teams from Mill Valley, Staley and Liberty North high schools. There are more than 400 kids taking part in scrimmages going on over two football fields. 

On the main field, Olivier is dominating.

One moment Liberty North tries to pick on him in the passing game. He’s having none of it and bats the pass down. 

A few plays later he diagnoses a pass in the flat and comes flying in to break it up. 

He’s feeling good. No, he’s feeling great. He lets out a primal scream. He flexes. He’s not trying to show up the opposition, he’s just bursting with energy and enthusiasm and his teammates feel it too. Suddenly, the whole defense is feeding off Olivier’s energy and the offense doesn’t stand a chance.

Mill Valley defensive coordinator Mike Strack liked what he saw.

“Jacob Olivier played really well with some really good energy, which spilled over to our entire defense,” he said.

The Staley scrimmage offered a different type of competition than what the Jaguars see in practice every day. New faces. New schemes. New techniques.

“It was great competition,” said junior Joshua Garcia. “I think it's really important to see how we stack up with those teams because the better teams we face the better we’re going to get.”

For the players the camp offered game-like situations. Players discovered how they stacked up against starters from other schools. No jobs are on the line here. Starters won’t be decided after just three weeks of workouts and conditioning and one scrimmage. Coaches are looking for improvement, effort, energy and coachability.

Senior Landon Stockwell understands this. He wants to start at safety for the Jaguars and he’s doing everything in his power to earn it. 

Dressed in a well worn blue jersey with the number 0 on the front, Stockwell retreats to the back of the endzone when he’s done playing on the field. He studies the offenses, getting a safety’s view of the action. 

He says he’s getting “visual reps.”

“What I was trying to do was read the offensive line to see whether it was indicating run or pass. I need to get better at reading and identifying formations,” Stockwell said. “Getting back there, watching what the team is doing and getting those mental reps in helps me play it in my mind so that when it’s time for me to get back on the field I know what to do and I’m ready to rock and roll.”

His efforts did not go unnoticed.

“I thought Landon Stockwell did a great job today trying to get us lined up right,” Strack said. “He did a great job staying focused even when we weren’t out there playing.

Junior defensive lineman Larry Jones was a standout on the defensive line according to Strack. A starter at defensive end last season, Jones will be relied on, along with senior Hayden Heller, to anchor the defensive line.

Strack felt Jones played fast and explosive during the scrimmage. For his part, Jones saw areas for improvement.

“I need to work on my get off and get lower and make better reads,” Jones said. 

For sophomore safety Jack Bullard, this was his first go-around at a camp. He had a great time competing against other teams but said he feels he needs to improve on shedding blocks and being more physical. 

Bullard admitted he has lots of work to do but appreciates the chance to go out and learn from his mistakes. 

“I felt like I messed up a little bit but I just kept going,” he said. “If I do something bad then I need to figure out what I did and go out there and fix it.”

On the offensive side, senior Blake Jay thought the offense performed well as a whole.

Jay, who played defensive back and wide receiver last year will focus more on offense in 2025.

“I thought that the o-line looked great. Receivers looked great. Running back. Everybody was doing their part today,” he said.

While he was happy with his overall performance, Jay felt that he can step up his game.

“I feel I can do a lot more,” he said. “There’s more in me. I have more energy and strength that I should be giving out. Even when, sometimes, I don’t think I can, I should be giving more.”

……

During these summer months coaches want to see daily improvement and how their players respond to coaching and adversity.

Jaguars offensive line coach Jesse Resseguie has a tall task ahead of him - building an offensive line that was hit hard by graduation. All-state tackle Lamarcus Barber returns to anchor the line but other than that it’s a free-for-all for the remaining starting spots. 

Today, Resseguie isn’t concerned about the depth chart or his line’s inexperience, he’s looking at effort and the fundamentals of line play.

“There’s going to be some things that don’t go right today and so it will be interesting to see how our kids handle that and move on from that,” he said

For defensive line coach Eric Thomas his message to his players was to have fun.

“Enjoy the competition. Enjoy being out here with your teammates. But also, focus on your technique. Work on doing what we’re supposed to do,” he said.

For two hours the Jaguars went out and threw down with a couple of quality teams from Missouri. It wasn’t perfect. At times it wasn’t pretty. But coaches were pleased with what they saw and see it as part of the growing experience.

“The kids flew around. I couldn’t be more proud of them,” said cornerback coach Paul Gilmore. “They’ve been taking everything that we’ve been teaching them and they’re applying it.”

The defensive line has been a strength of Mill Valley for many years. Defensive line coach Tim Thomas wants to make sure that 2025 is no exception. Thomas was born to be a coach. He talks with authority and can be vocal and demanding. He liked what he saw at the scrimmage.

“I thought, effort wise we were fantastic,” he said. “Guys were flying to the ball and trying to do their job. That was something I enjoyed seeing. I think we played pretty sound which is hard to do at the beginning of the year.”

Thomas is excited about the group of young men he has to work with.

“The intangibles, the things you can’t coach, these kids have,” he said. “They want it. They’re passionate about it. We’re still refining stuff. There’s still plenty of work to do.”

Strack thought Mill Valley brought great effort and toughness to the scrimmage.

“I wanted to see our kids embrace the idea of getting better but do it at a really high speed and at a high, competitive, level. I also wanted to see that competitive energy and I thought we had that today,” he said.

At the end of the day Jaguars head coach Joel Applebee was pleased with what he saw on the field — mistakes and all. 

“We’re all teachers. That’s what we do — break the process down and teach day by day. We were better today than we were yesterday,” Applebee said. “That’s the goal every single day this summer.”

While the ultimate goal for Mill Valley remains the same year after year — a state championship — the steps to get there are only just beginning.

“There’s not a team in the state of Missouri or Kansas that’s winning a state championship today,” Applebee told his team at the end of the scrimmage. “It’s a process man. We’re going to get better and better and better and by the time November rolls around we’re going to be playing some pretty freaking’ good football.”